Very easy. Not everyone likes exploration for the sake of seeing pretty pictures. Some people like to explore to find interesting stuff to do, or to find interesting lore. Furthermore, exploring in GW2 doesn't even guarantee that you will encounter events. Only today, after I spent two hours exploring new areas around the zone I'm in, I encountered only two events. This essentially means that I need to go back to the areas I already explored and hope that a random event will pop up - I wouldn't exactly call this exploring.

I suppose it's possible to miss every event for hours although it would seem very hard unless you're the only one playing still you are rewarded with XP no matter what you do be it gathering, crafting, events or just plain exploring the map so at the very least you have a very good control of how "grindy" you want to make it and in that sense no other game even comes close as you are pretty much forced to follow a certain path to gain levels.

I should probably admit and say I don't easily grind down aswell it's never been something that was a problem for me in other games where it was more prevalent than here and just as one example I have leveled numerous pets up in WoW from low levels to max (then 70) by farming leather for weeks (yes it used to take that long) just cause I liked the look of them, oh it also made me rich as heck.

Go and Explore

Originally Posted by Arothand

The main thing I have in GW2 is that sometimes I run out of hearts. Like, I've done all of the ones in the area, and the ones further away are too high level (I'm only like level 10 or something). So I'm literally left standing there thinking "Okay, what do I do? The event things are too high level, the story quest is too high level, am I supposed to just go grind mobs to level while I wait for an event to happen?" and it doesn't feel very fluid at all. It's one of the worst things about GW2 for me because it's not obvious what you should do, whereas in traditional MMOs like WoW or Rift or SWTOR you have quests that take you to another quest hub. GW2 seems to be do all the heart things, and other than that wait and hope you get an event?

Hi, I ran into this problem too, got to a point where the hearted areas around me where a bit above my level. What I would suggest is to look for lower level areas, next to the zone you are in. As your level automatically adjusts downwards they are still good to explore. You can also find skill points and other rewards for completing them. For example south of the human starting area is the zone where the Sylvari start from and to the west of that is the Asuri area. Or if you go to Lion's Arch you from what I undertsand can portal to any of the startiing zones from there. So in short, if youre stuck, go and explore

I think you're essentially correct....and why I am struggling in GW2 and why I quit playing Rift. I don't mind an event here or there but I don't like them to be the dominate feature. The stories or lore really do come from the events but to travel to them constantly is highly annoying. One reason I find them annoying is because there isn't a sense of 'direction', you just run around (at a slow pace) the map to find or trigger them. In some cases you can do them alone and in others you can't so if you're alone well, you're not doing that event. I do prefer the WoW method of questing now that I've seen this thread and thought about it. This has been a good thread and an interesting read.

Events in GW2 feel much more immersive to me while in WoW quests feel much more static.

In WoW the player is very much in control of the questing process. He chooses to pick up the quest and then he chooses when to go out and complete the task. Very straightforward.

In GW2 an event can overtake you even when you aren't looking for it. You can be talking to a vendor and suddenly the little outpost you're in is overrun by Sons of Svanir, your vendor is cowering in fear and you must choose to participate in the defense or flee.

If enough people flee and the post is left undefended, I will come by later and maybe find it in smoking ruins or controlled by the enemy.

In GW2 a soldier runs up to me telling me of his plans and asks me to to take care of one thing while he does another. If I choose to ignore his request, I can come back later to a very different world.

I've watched the culmination of events, meta events - ships blowing up, bridges being torn down, world bosses, portals or paths opening to new places. These are not merely cutscenes - this is in real live game. Every server has a different world.

Funny this thread got necro'd but it's pretty well timed for me as I played mostly MoP the past month or so and the occasional GW2, I know I can't go back to the old questing system it makes me want to shoot myself atleast the way it's done in Pandaria and as a result I still haven't managed to reach 90 on any WoW toon since that is the only efficent way to level, it's too restricted you have to follow the one hub leading to the other and you can't go to the next zone before you level up cause then you don't get any quests at all anyway, if I could move around more freely to quest from the start I would have liked that.

My friend and I were having a rather... um, "unsavoury" discussiong the other night. We both play GW2, but he quit WoW middway through TBC whereas I still play it. The discussion was about the Questing Pattern in WoW - ya know, youll get like 2 or 3 quests for a little area, and you kill 10 <Insert mob>, collect 5 <Insert item>, and perform 3 <Insert comedic/vanity acts (maybe like free 3 prisoners or something)> .

And it came to my realization that the Heart quests in GW2 are begginning to blur into the same repetitive actions as the WoW quests are. I've completed the entire Asura starting zone (1-15 zone), and I can only assume that the Heart quests wont be able to vary much further from the pattern they already have, given that you can right click an object, kill adds, or revive NPCs. I know, you can do whatever mix of things you want to in the Hearts, but their still pretty repetitive in my mind.

Do you think GW2 Heart Quests are repetitive, or do they actually somehow become more varied at higher levels?

I knew it from the beginning. You guys did not believed me. There may be some point where its new, but mostly they are the same thing.